Two Women
BONY FLEW TO Sydney, where he paid his respects to the Chief of the New South Wales CIB, and gained willing cooperation.
A police car took him out to Ashfield at ten in the morning, an unfortunate hour for a lady whose habits are irregular. The house at which the car stopped was charming, the front door being protected by a finely-wrought iron grille with the bell centred unobtrusively amid the petals of an ornamental flower.
An elderly woman answered the summons and, on sighting the detectives, instantly betrayed irritation. Upon being requested to inform her mistress they wished to interview her, she conducted them to a restfully furnished lounge. There they sat for twenty-five minutes before Opal Jane appeared.
If Opal Jane was displeased, she didn’t show it. She was dainty, vivacious, dark and distinctly beautiful, and dressed with that sort of simplicity which means dollars in any man’s language. She smiled coolly at the detective sergeant, and with interest not wholly feigned regarded the man who looked like a rajah in civvies.
The detective sergeant presented Bony quite creditably. Opal Jane’s demeanour was unchanged.
“I never rise before eleven, Inspector Bonaparte. I suppose you’ve come to ask more and more questions. I’m beginning to wish I’d never met that wretched man.”
“Our friends are sometimes most embarrassing,” Bony murmured, holding a match to her cigarette. “I hate having to talk shop with you, and would prefer to discuss books and flowers. You knew the late Thomas Baker, for how long?”
The violet eyes hardened.
“Surely you are not going to ask the same questions, Inspector Bonaparte,” she said. “I knew Baker for about five years. In that time he’s called on me about seven or eight times. As I’ve told the Sergeant, Baker was a second steward on a liner.”
“You were really unaware that he traded in imitation pearls and other things?”
“I certainly was. I don’t associate with crooks.”
Bony nodded as though pleased that so unpleasant a subject was finished.
“Tell me, what kind of a man was Baker… personality?”
“Oh! A good sort. Inspector. He could play around. Free with his money, and not one to be upset over trifles.”
“Expensive tastes?”
“Yes, he liked the best of everything.”
“Did it never occur to you that his salary as second steward, even on a first-class liner, would barely meet his expenditures?”
“No… o.”
“I understand that he presented you with several most expensive opals, that he took you often to exclusive night clubs.”
Opal Jane smiled.
“You’re not deliberately being naive, Inspector?”
“Perhaps I am being natural. Thomas Baker could have been in receipt of a private income. Your friendship with him was… platonic?”
“He wanted to marry me. They all do. As to the source of his income, I never concern myself about the financial affairs of my friends…excepting their ability with a cheque-book.”
“Is one of your friends named Eldred Wessex?”
Opal Jane shook her head, and Bony was satisfied that Eldred Wessex was not one of herclientele. Still, a name often conveys nothing. From his wallet he took the picture of Eldred Wessex, hatless and standing with five other soldiers. Everything bar the head of Wessex he had obliterated with Indian ink.
“Have you ever seen that man?” he asked, proffering the picture.
Violet eyes clashed with blue eyes and the woman realized that in this dark man all her feminine artifice would profit her nothing.
Opal Jane carried the picture to the window. The detective sergeant looked bored. Bonaparte admired a painting of a ship under full sail. The woman returned to her chair before speaking.
“I don’t know why I should answer your last question,” she said. “I had nothing to do with Baker’s murder, and I don’t want to be mixed up with it.”
“Surely I may assume that, having been friendly with Baker, you do not wish his murderer to escape the legal penalty? Or have you something still hidden from us? Forgive the implication, but I cannot evade it.”
“I’ve nothing to hide. I want to be left in peace. Yes, I’ve seen this man. Once when I was dining with Tom Baker at The Blue Mist. He came to our table and spoke to Tom. Another time, Tom and I were going out to Randwick and he stopped for a moment to speak as we were about to get into a taxi. I don’t know his name. And Tom Baker never referred to him.”
“When was it you last saw him?”
“Before Christmas… in November, I think it was.”
“At the two meetings of these men, did they appear friendly?”
“Yes, in an off-hand way. I’d say they were acquaintances rather than friends. They were quite pleasant to each other.”
Bonyrose, and Opal Jane smilingly rose with him.
“Have you done with me, Inspector? So soon?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” Bony blandly told her. “It was good of you to receive us so early. I’ve been surreptitiously admiring that painting and the bookcase, which is quite a treasure.”
“I’m glad you like my bits, Inspector. My father was an alcoholic and my mother died from cocaine. The home… you can imagine. What life withheld from the child, the woman has squeezed from it.”
In the hall, Bony remarked:
“Your passion for opals is something I can understand. Pearls! Do you like pearls?”
Opal Jane smiled most sweetly.
“I never refuse pearls, Inspector. Sawyer and White have a lovely string at five hundred guineas… if you happen to be interested. And I’ll promise to keep them for a little while. You see, I prefer opals, knowing something about them. Pearls I always sell for cash.”
The sergeant opened the front door, and still Bony lingered.
“D’youknowif Thomas Baker had a second Christian name?”
“I never heard of it.”
“Or a pet name… a nickname?”
“No. He was always Tom to me.”
Thank you.” Bony smiled and reached the doorstep. “Favour me by pronouncing the letter T, will you?”
Opal Jane obliged.
“Now the letter B.”
Again the woman complied and again Bony blandly smiled and wished her goodbye.
In the police car which was taking them to Coogee, he asked:
“Did you note any similarity in the pronunciation of the letters T and B?”
“Yes, faintly, I think,” replied the sergeant.
They left the car at a huge block of flats, and the sergeant rang the bell of Number 46. A young woman appeared indeshabille and escorted by the aroma of frying sausages. Her brown eyes lit with interest in Bony, and hardened at the sight of the sergeant, whose civilian clothes were no disguise.
“What is it?” she demanded, briskly.
“Are you Jean Stebbings?” asked Bony.
“I am. Whatd’youwant?”
“We are police officers, Miss Stebbings. Will you invite us inside? I want to ask a few questions.”
“All right! Come in. In there, please. I’ll turn off the gas.”
They found themselves in a tiny sitting room, and when the girl entered she had attended to her hair and face. The shrewd sergeant assessed her correctly. Bony persuaded her to be seated, saying:
“You know a man named Eldred Wessex, do you not?”
Yes,” she replied, barely above a whisper, to add, fiercely: “Go on. Tell me. I like it quick.”
“When did you last see him?”
“See him! Why, weeks ago. What’s happened to him?”
“Nothing that I’m aware of. What is he to you?”
The girl fought and temporarily conquered her anxiety, Bony patiently waiting. Her clasped hands stilled their agitation, and he noted the wedding ring. She lifted her head, as though with pride, and a blush stirred under her skin.
“Eldred is… was… my man. We’re going to be married some day.” The fears returned. “Where is he? Why don’t you tell me where he is?”
“Don’t you know?”
“Would I be asking you?”
“Dick Lake doesn’t know, either.”
“So he told me. Before he walked off a cliff. I seen that in the papers.”
“What made you write to Dick about Eldred?” pressed Bony.
“Dick was his friend. Eldred came from Split Point. They were in the war together. But you know all that. You know more, too. What’s happened to Eldred? Go on, tell me.”
“I know neither where he is nor what’s happened to him, if anything,” Bony said, quietly. “I am seeking your aid to locate him.”
“All right! Then what’s he done?”
“Other people as well as you are anxious to know where Eldred Wessex is,” Bony continued, quietly. “It’s my job to trace missing persons. Dozens of people are reported missing every year. Many fade away purposely. What work did Wessex do here in Sydney?”
“Something to do with Security Service, so he told me. Said it suited him because he felt so restless after the army life. But… I wrote to Security Service, and they sent a man here to tell me they didn’t know anything about him.”
“How long have you known him?”
“Just a year.”
“Did he have any friends in Sydney?”
“Not that I know.”
“Acquaintances then?”
“A few, yes.”
“Was this man one of them?” Bony softly asked.
The girl accepted the picture, glanced at it, dropped it to the floor. She startled even the stolid sergeant.
“He didn’t! He didn’t! He didn’t do it!” she cried, shrilly.
“What on earth are you talking about, Miss Stebbings?” asked Bony, and she answered accusingly:
“That’s the man in the bath. That’s the man they found murdered in the Lighthouse. Eldred never did that, I tell you. He never went back to Split Point. Dick Lake told me. Kept on telling me Eldred never went home.”
“You recognize this man, though, the man found in the Lighthouse?”
“Yes. No, I don’t. I’ve never seen him.”
The tortured face was defiant, and Bony guessed at the battle being fought by this woman to remove the load of suspicion from her mind, a battle which had been proceeding since Eldred Wessex left her. Gently, he said:
“Would it be better for you to know the truth about Eldred? To know why he went away, why he hasn’t written, instead of going on from day to day worrying yourself sick about him?”
The woman’s face was like a vase suddenly overtaken by centuries of time. She broke into a storm of weeping, burying her face in a handkerchief, both hands to the handkerchief. The wedding ring was too large. It swivelled round her finger. It wasn’t a wedding ring.
“Let us try to unearth the truth, Miss Stebbings,” Bony urged. “Not to know will always be worse than knowing. Who was the man murdered in the Lighthouse?”
“Eldred called him Tommy,” moaned the girl. “He came here once with Eldred. Eldred said he was in Security Service, too. Then he called in the afternoon of the day Eldred went away. He came asking for Eldred, and I said he was out. He didn’t come again after that.”
“What was the date?”
The watchful detective sergeant noticed the iron in Bony’s voice, and wondered at the placidity of expression as they waited through another outburst of grief. Bony produced a second picture.
“Is this your Eldred?”
She dabbed at her eyes. Bony looked at the ring. She gazed at the picture of Wessex shown to Opal Jane, and slowly nodded. Bony passed the picture to the detective sergeant and waited for the girl to regain something of composure. It was the sergeant who asked the next question:
“D’youknowa man called Waghorn?”
“No. Only heard about him. Never seen him. Never want to.”
“Wessexsay anything about Waghorn?”
“Never.”
“When did Eldred leave you… the date… Miss Stebbings?”proceeded Bony.
“On my birthday. It was my birthday. Eldred left home after breakfast saying he would be bringing me a string of pearls. He never did. He never came back.”
“What is your birth date?”
“February 26th.”
Bony stood up to leave. Bending over the girl, he patted her shoulder.
“We’ll find your man, Miss Stebbings. Did he give you that ring?”
“No. He let me wear it until he could give me a wedding ring.”